It Was 50 Years Ago Today

[Slim]

The debut Rush album was released on Moon Records on 18th March, 1974.

Strictly speaking the band's recording career had already started a few months earlier when Not Fade Away / You Can't Fight It was released as a single; nonetheless those early tunes were quickly forgotten in the scheme of things, whereas some of the first album songs held down a spot in the band's set for their whole touring career and are undoubtedly classics.








The album had a difficult birth but I'm sure everyone reading this knows all about that.

It was the last of the studio albums that I got round to buying after becoming a fan. I listened to it for the first time on Christmas Day 1979, even though I'd already seen them seven times. Music was more expensive than concert tickets, in those days. I was very familiar with some of the tunes from All The World's A Stage, of course.

To me it's the shorter, punchier tunes that are most successful - Finding My Way and What You're Doing especially.

[Thenop]

Knowing the history it's a marvel it turned out like it did. I actualy quite like the sound.
Apart from the ones you mentioned, it is the Working Man album for me and I like Here Again. Not a barnstormer in any manner, but I guess it was as good as most contemporaries' debuts. It feels unfair measuring it against their later output, it became such a different band.

[The Picnic Wasp]

Unbelievable! Fifty years! Always loved the album but how they progressed from the naïveté of this to, "When our weary world was young.........in five short years still, and always will baffle me. The improvement in writing, playing and creativity was exponential to say the very least. Here Again is a favourite of mine too. Geddy's singing switches seamlessly from the sweetness that Alex used to describe, to the raucousness of a belt sander hitting a hidden screwhead. I have to admit to total jealousy for James having seen them seven times by 1979. The band were just a name to me even then having heard the odd track at parties, but nothing managing to stick with me. I think I spent much of my teens in town wondering what the 2112 patches on the backs of Wrangler jackets were all about. My back catalogue consumption was obsessive in the extreme however. Such an indelible stamp on my youth that emotions come too easily just to focus on it even briefly. I have a feeling it will still be alive on another fifty years. I hope so.

[Matt2112]

Their most purely "fun" album.  Presumably like most here, this wasn't my introduction to the band; that happened with Moving Pictures, when I was eight years old - my older brothers have a lot to answer for.

I kind of worked backwards from MP, but as we had a copy of Archives in the house I made my way chronologically through that and have always liked the debut most out of the first three.

[Thenop]

Their most purely "fun" album.  Presumably like most here, this wasn't my introduction to the band; that happened with Moving Pictures, when I was eight years old - my older brothers have a lot to answer for.

I kind of worked backwards from MP, but as we had a copy of Archives in the house I made my way chronologically through that and have always liked the debut most out of the first three.

Funny you should mention that. In the early 80s record companies released compilation albums that you could pick up relatively cheap. Being an entry level thing, they usually put quite an array of artists on those albums. And so I came to hear the 2 medley from Atwas in 81 or so. OK, I figured, the album also had Thin Lizzy's Got to give it up and Rainbows Stargazer (live with Bonnet) and I soon played the whole thing to death. But being released in 81,and they wanted to put out product, another comp was released in 83 (and some more in between with other bands) called 'Hard Rock 83'. What a job you have if you come up with a title like that.. Anyway, Rush was on there as well, this time though with the Analog Kid and I couldn't believe my ears. Was this really the same band? And in 84 comp 'the Heavy Way' listed Between the Wheels.
Funny how those things go, because I fell for The Analog Kid and BTW before I explored further. Friend of a friend taped Exit SL for me and AftK and I was sold from then on.
That debut album was one of the last ones I got, was never a priority to me.

[The Picnic Wasp]

Just noticed from the photo of very early in their career that the backdrop is a plaque dedicating a garden. Quite apt.

[Slim]

I sometimes think of the debut album as being one of the better Rush albums - maybe in the top third, but really I don't think it is. I dug out a list I made a few years ago and I ranked only six of the nineteen studio albums lower: A Farewell To Kings, Presto, Counterparts, Roll the Bones, Vapor Trails and Snakes & Arrows.

It is a good album though and some of those records I've just listed definitely aren't.

[The Picnic Wasp]

From that list I only have a problem with Snakes & Arrows, but that's probably more to do with where my mind was at that time. I don't think I would listen to Presto from start to finish these days but AFTK and Counterparts remain favourites. However, I was thinking just the other day about what my five desert island Rush albums would be and concluded;

Hemispheres
Permanent Waves
Moving Pictures
Signals
Power Windows

I'd miss a lot of the rest greatly, but these are my essentials.

[David L]

It is a good album though and some of those records I've just listed definitely aren't.

In your (not so humble) opinion

[Fishy]

I think I can say I will never be tempted to listen to the first album ever again.. just nothing on it that would make me want to dig it out.. I started in 1980 on PW then worked back the way so by the time I got to the first album it was pretty underwhelming

[pxr5]

Well, I played this quite recently when following Geddy Lee's autobiography and I still like it. I got into Rush around Hemispheres/Permanent Waves and worked my way back. My sister bought me Archives and it all sounded great to my ears. OK a couple of clunkers (Need Some Love, In the Mood), but then there is Working Man and Here Again. I really like its rawness and naivety. I'd take this over quite a bit of their 80s output any day.

[Fishy]

I think the earliest album I could listen to in its entirety any more would be CoS..

[Slim]

Fifty years ago, at the time the first album was released, the band were playing a string of dates at a venue in Toronto cleverly disguised as a London tube station:



Six consecutive nights, March 18th - 23rd.

Odd to think that they were putting out their fourth album exactly two years after the first was released. I'm hoping that we can use this thread as a sort of time machine, so we can follow key events as they happen, timeshifted by 50 years, to get an idea of the timescales in real time. I did something similar with a Beatles Twitter account, it was quite enlightening.

[Slim]

And fifty years ago this evening, the band are playing the Victory Theatre in Toronto - possibly as a support act?

https://www.rush.com/tour/rush/

They'd supported the New York Dolls there the previous October as Alex wrote for a newspaper article, later transcribed in My Effin' Life.



The building is now a "drugstore" and visible here on Google Street View.

[Thenop]

And fifty years ago this evening, the band are playing the Victory Theatre in Toronto - possibly as a support act?

https://www.rush.com/tour/rush/

They'd supported the New York Dolls there the previous October as Alex wrote for a newspaper article, later transcribed in My Effin' Life.



The building is now a "drugstore" and visible here on Google Street View.

the "Wandering the Face of the Earth" book lists this: